The Incentives to Start New Companies: Evidence from Venture Capital

The standard venture-capital contract rewards entrepreneurs only for creating successful companies that go public or are acquired on favorable terms. As a result, entrepreneurs receive no help from venture capital in avoiding the huge idiosyncratic risk of the typical venture-backed startup. Entrepreneurs earned an average of $9 million from each company that succeeded in attracting venture funding. But entrepreneurs are generally specialized in their own companies and bear the burden of the idiosyncratic risk. Entrepreneurs with a coefficient of relative risk aversion of two would be willing to sell their interests for less than$1 million at the outset rather than face that risk. The standard financial contract provides entrepreneurs capital supplied by passive investors and rewards entrepreneurs for successful outcomes. We track the division of value for a sample of the great majority of U.S. venture-funded companies over the period form 1987 through 2005. Venture capitalists received an average of $5 million in fee revenue from each company they backed. The outside investors in venture capital received a financial return substantially above that of publicly traded companies, but that the excess is mostly a reward for bearing risk. The pure excess return measured by the alpha of the Capital Asset Pricing Model is positive but may reflect only random variation.

Capital budgeting under relational contracting: optimal ranking and duration criteria for schemes of concession, project-financing and public-private partnership

Project-financing and public-private partnership schemes are joint projects of investment that are generally submitted to investment valuation criteria based on compound discounting. However, the theoretical basis of these criteria is at issue nowadays. According to recent studies on relational contracting economics and behavioral finance, joint projects of investment can be considered as special relational environments where the project's returns improve on alternative replacement opportunities. This article aims to bridge the gap between new theories and widespread valuation techniques by providing a generalised approach to investment valuation. This article suggests new valuation criteria that fit those theoretical developments, including an endogenous optimal duration that the project's contractual agreement may integrate.discounting; investment decision criteria; capital budgeting; project finance and public private partnerships; endogenous optimal duration; cost of capital for government

International accounting standards (IAS): implications for financial institutions

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Optimal Valuation and Timing of Price Benchmarks for IT Services Contracts

Information technology (IT) services contracts often contain provisions for benchmarking fixed prices to current market prices. Prices of IT services tend to be opaque, but can be revealed through third-party benchmarks. Little research has been conducted on the value and timing of such benchmarks. We draw upon the theory of mortgage refinance and value-at-risk analysis from financial economics, and the IT investment under uncertainty literature to create a model of the benchmarking decision for IT services contracts. Our model permits the determination of the value and optimal timing of the benchmark. We provide conditions under which a client firm should consider one or multiple benchmark provisions. Our solution is robust to uncertainty surrounding benchmark forecasts. Firms can leverage market price uncertainties and exercise benchmarks even when the potential rate of declining IT prices does not reach a minimum threshold to benchmark

Employment protection and product market competition

A firm facing employment protection will defend its market position more fiercely than a firm operating without such restrictions. However, ex ante it will be more reluctant to expand its market position. For the benchmark case of contest competition, the defensive effect dominates. A firm facing employment protection has a stronger average market position. -- Ein Unternehmen, das Kündigungsschutzbestimmungen ausgesetzt ist, verteidigt seine Marktposition stärker als ein konkurrierendes Unternehmen, das ohne derartige Restriktion agiert. Ex ante wird es jedoch vorsichtiger sein, seine Marktposition auszudehnen, da es die potentiellen Kosten im Falle einer späteren Verschlechterung der eigenen Marktposition vermeiden möchte. Für den Benchmarkfall, in dem der Wettbewerb zwischen den Unternehmen die Form eines Contests annimmt, überwiegt der defensive Effekt: Ein Unternehmen, das Kündigungsschutzbestimmungen ausgesetzt ist, hat langfristig eine stärkere Position im Markt als ein Wettbewerber der frei von solchen Restriktionen agiert.Employment protection,contests,all-pay auction

Major League Baseball Player Contracts: An Investigation of the Empirical Properties of Real Options

We study contracts negotiated between professional baseball players and teams to investigate the use of real options in a commercial setting. Baseball contracts feature options in diverse forms, and we find that these options have significant effects on player compensation. As predicted by theory, players receive higher guaranteed compensation when they allow teams to take options on their future services, and lower salaries when they bargain for options to extend their own contracts. The apparent value of options decreases as a function of the "spread" between option exercise price and annual salary and increases as a function of the time until exercise. Implied volatility of the options lies within the range found for other assets

Major League Baseball Player Contracts: An Investigation of the Empirical Properties of Real Options

We study contracts negotiated between professional baseball players and teams to investigate the use of real options in a commercial setting. Baseball contracts feature options in diverse forms, and we find that these options have significant effects on player compensation. As predicted by theory, players receive higher guaranteed compensation when they allow teams to take options on their future services, and lower salaries when they bargain for options to extend their own contracts. The apparent value of options decreases as a function of the "spread" between option exercise price and annual salary and increases as a function of the time until exercise. Implied volatility of the options lies within the range found for other assets

Who is the ultimate master of contractual, regulatory, discretionary and residual cash flows? An answer from the standpoint of corporate governance

This paper sets forth a framework of analysis that links contractual, discretionary, regulatory and residual cash flows with decision rights over them. To attain this purpose, firstly we introduce the standard incremental cash flow model, underlying its main limitations. Secondly, we move on bringing to light cash flows to senior management and directors, as well as the so-often neglected investment portfolio. Next, we settle down to what we are going to call the compact cash flow model that comprises five building blocks, namely those arising out of assets, those addressed to owners, creditors, managers and directors, and lastly the company’s investment portfolio. Afterwards, contractual, discretionary, regulatory and residual cash flows are enlarged upon. Last of all, we focus on decision rights over every constituent of each building block. This issue carries weight in Corporate Governance since stakeholders who claim or exercise decision rights, also could trespass on the rules of the game, becoming better off to the expense and damage of other stakeholders.corporate governance; contractual, regulatory, discretional and residual cash flows; decision rights; incremental cash flow model

Major League Baseball Player Contracts: An Investigation of the Empirical Properties of Real Options

We study contracts negotiated between professional baseball players and teams to investigate the use of real options in a commercial setting. Baseball contracts feature options in diverse forms, and we find that these options have significant effects on player compensation. As predicted by theory, players receive higher guaranteed compensation when they allow teams to take options on their future services, and lower salaries when they bargain for options to extend their own contracts. The apparent value of options decreases as a function of the "spread" between option exercise price and annual salary and increases as a function of the time until exercise